Damien felt like his lungs were being crushed from inside his body. He was on all fours vomiting across the race track, his eyes watery as he panted. The shadowy form of Damien was holding a hand up to block it as he looked the other direction, making an ew face. Core was even feeling a little disturbed by the noises he was making, trying to stay as far over on the interface as he could.

  “This sucks.” Damien blurted out, wiping his mouth clean before slowly standing up, his legs wobbling.

  *Would you like to try again?

  Covered the interface on his screen as he contemplated on what the best course of action would be. He could spend his skill points in dexterity, and hope that it made him faster. The only problem with that was, he may not wanna use them for that, this was his problem with video games and RPG’s. He hoarded everything afraid that he would need it later. RPG’s he hoarded skill points till he absolutely HAD to use them.

  Trying to get his knees to stop wobbling he looked around for a second examining the crowd. He hated to have to do this, but he couldn’t see any other way around it. He had to accept his failure, and back out and recuperate.

  This was going on his 5th attempt, and down to dry heaving if he had to attempt to vomit again. No matter how hard he ran, this was not a magical system where will power alone could force him to out do his opponent. He had to actually get better, Damien was realizing that now. If shark tooth wasn’t his sword he wouldn’t have made that leap over to the platform of the tree.

  Sitting down on the ground a good ways away from the vomit, he raised a finger and slowly tapped no. The world around him began shaking and ripped away up into the sky, it was like the reverse of what had happened previously, the world slowly returning back to normal as his shadow dissolved back into normal.

  **CONGRATULATIONS ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED**

  Something blared across the screen making him jump some, all the running was killing his head. He knew for a fact he couldn’t keep putting up with the random pop ups if this was how he was going to feel after quests. Yet, he was curious on the achievement he unlocked.

  Scanning over it and letting the screen appear he read.

  *Congratulations, you've admitted defeat. While your rewards aren't given to you. You receive a new ring!*

  *Ring of Failure. Wearing this grants you +1 to your wisdom stat.

  *It takes Wisdom to know when you gotta throw in the towel!

  ‘Huh.’ Damien thought as the ring slowly materialized in front of him in his palm, it was a black with a purple glowing liquid around the center. Sliding it on, he took a breath and felt at peace with his decision. He didn’t win, but something about accepting defeat made it feel a little more sweater.

  “Well, dang kid. Even in failure you're a winner.” Core said with a smirk walking into the interface visual.

  “Are there a lot of achievements?”

  “Take a look for yourself!”

  Damien did just that, pulling up the achievement board most were locked and hidden. They were broken down into three categories.

  *Hidden

  *Secret

  *Unknown

  “Isn’t these all the same thing?” Damien asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “Yes, yes they are. Hidden means you gotta find them, Secret means they are unlocked when very specific things are met, and unknown is unknown.”

  “That….doesn't really make sense, they all mean the same thing.”

  “Yes. Yes they do.”

  Damien blinked a few times, his brain felt like it was going to fry for a second. It felt like place holders that never got fully resolved, which was a little agitating since it left him even more clueless on what he was supposed to do with this new found information.

  “Alright, moving on, so I can just accept failure whenever I want?”

  “Nope, some quests will not let you accept failure. Imagine if you fell from that tree, your failure would have been death.”

  “I thought you didn’t know what would happen?”

  “I didn’t, but now that we have completed it, I'm able to confidently say they unblocked that knowledge.”

  “Great, so no insight help from the godly artifact.”

  “If I told you everything, you wouldn’t learn anything. Some things aren’t taught. You gotta take a leap of faith.”

  Damien grumbled, while the logic was there he wasn’t a big fan of it. Pushing himself up, he made his way towards the nearby hot dog vendor in the park. Dropping some cash on the vendor's cart, he grabbed two dogs.

  They were nice, juicy, covered in home made chili, nacho cheese, and special sauce. Damien began chowing down on them, he felt worn down and drained beyond belief. Wiping his mouth he began walking through the park, he couldn’t remember the last time he really came around this area.

  The trees were nice, tall, thankfully not too tall though. Geese were walking around the pond, the temperature was just right as well. It was a nice, cool summer breeze and it wasn’t pouring down sweat besides his typical run.

  Listening to the pond water sway back and forth left him feeling calm and at peace, he couldn’t remember the last time he just sat and enjoyed nature like this. It brought back a peace inside of him, like when his dad would bring him here. Back when they were all a family, it was peaceful.

  Slowly he closed his eyes to rest, and absorb the presence of the world.

  “Hey kid! Wake up!” A voice blared through his ears causing him to jerk awake. Damien hadn’t even realized it, he fell asleep, but it was a really good sleep. Damien rubbed his eyes and looked around, the nice red tint of the sky as the sun was beginning to set made him glance around seeing an even emptier park. No animals or nothing.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “What time is it?” Damien asked with a soft yawn before slowly pushing himself up off the bench and scratching his chest with a much deeper yawn. “It's 6pm, it's sunset, kid.” Core told him. Damien wasn’t too sure how long he had been asleep, he got to the park later in the afternoon, hour for the tree climb, and who knew how long he ran.

  “A couple hours? Why didn’t you wake me?”

  “Well, you were so darn cute kiddo!” Core said sarcastically before continuing, “I tried! You were worn out! When was the last time you got some good sleep?”

  Damien thought about the question, when was the last time he had some real sleep? He didn’t have nightmares, but he didn’t feel rested when he slept. Stress hormones, and chemical imbalances on top of other things really screwed with him when he tried to sleep. Maybe with the system he was beginning to balance back out.

  “I'm not sure honestly, to think about it, I don't think I've had really good sleep for a long time.”

  “That's for sure! Lets get out of here, I'd hate to watch you get mugged!”

  “Wow, thanks.” Damien said, rolling his eyes before he began walking through the park and into the town side walk. Damien hadn’t been outside at sunset for a while either, at least not where he paid much attention. The strawberry rose kiss from the heavens slowly touching down on earth, it was the perfect goldy locks hour as directors had called it.

  Walking through the town, he heard a noise. It wasn’t a pretty one either. The sound of a fist against flesh, something Damien had heard and felt all too many times. Taking a pause, he stared out towards the nearby alleyway. Slowly he took a few steps before pausing again, something was tugging at his stomach to run away and hide. He really wanted to listen.

  Damien didn’t put himself into situations where he accepted being bullied, usually they just found him. He had a feeling this was another situation that was about to just find him. Peering around the corner he saw it, a boy about 14 at most, against a wall getting punched in the gut as he let out a heavy spew of spit.

  Damien saw three kids, older than the boy but younger than Damien. “What do we do?” Damien asked in a hushed tone, “First of all, you talk in your head not out loud. Otherwise, why be sneaky.” Core said, shaking his head on the screen to the side of his view.

  ‘Right sorry, what do we do?’

  “What do you mean? Do we fight or run?”

  ‘I don't know, that's why I'm asking you!’ Damien said, to any passerby seeing him, it looked like he was just making faces for absolutely no reason.

  “Look kid, I ain't gonna stop ya. However, remember that once you get into a fight, using your weapons will harm humans.”

  ‘Woah wait, they can actually be used on people?’

  “WELL DUH! They aren’t toys, if you wanted a foam weapon you should have tried to find that one. I think it was one of the original weapons created.”

  ‘A foam weapon was one of the first-’ Damien shook his head trying to get back on track. ‘Okay, well..’ Damien began debating options when he remembered a tool of the interface.

  Opening up the screen HUD he could see the names of the bullies and the kid being beaten on.

  *Toby Marks

  *14

  ‘The kids' name is Toby Marks,’ Damien said when suddenly a quest appeared on screen.

  *Quest created: Protect Toby Marks.*

  Damien stood frozen, the idea of having to fight some random people to save a kid he didn’t know brought in an entirely new feeling of uncomfortableness. Looking past the screen towards the kid he closed his eyes and began tapping his fist against the brick alley wall.

  “Darn it!” He shouted and swung around the corner, “Hey! Leave him alone!”

  The world felt frozen for a moment, the three thugs looking back at Damien Toby slowly looking up as the sun sat behind him.

  Damien wondered if someone stood up for him what it would have been like, would he have been expelled? Would it have gotten that far? Slowly taking steps towards them, the thoughts moved faster.

  Would he have been a trouble maker? Would his be as depressed as he has been? Would he have had friends, would he have dated Lucy, would have this, or that. Damien slowly let the thoughts of the what if swarm all around him till finally, it was just him a few feet away from the thugs.

  “What did you say to us?” The leader said, two goons behind him one on each side.

  “I said let the kid go, I'm not gonna repeat myself-” Damien was cut off immediately, a fist thrown in his direction. It wasn’t that Damien thought he could win the fight, he was hoping they would back down from intimidation that someone was willing to stand up too them. It seems they did not care at all.

  Stumbling back, he had dodged it just in time for the fist to whiz past him. “Woah, so much for talking!” Damien stated, at first he went to summon Shark tooth before remembering what Core said, he could kill them.

  That thought made him lose focus, SMACK!

  Damien felt a fist slam into his face as he stumbled back with a cracked nose. Blood pouring form it, it hurt, but Damien had felt similar pain from Billy. There was another swing, Damien's arms went up. ‘Why am I fighting?’ He wondered about feeling the fist slam into his arm, another fist hit his arm again. He was mimicking the fighters he had seen in his video games, they stood brave and heroic. He mimicked comic books, anything from his arsenal he could pull from even if it wasn’t accurate. It was better than just getting beaten down, plus he needed to complete the quest, he wanted that money.

  Damien began backing up with each hit, he suddenly felt a strike to the stomach causing him to tense up, His arm latched onto the head honchos arm as it was in his stomach still. Damien reared back and punched him straight in the jaw causing him to stumble backwards. Pure shock went across Damien's face, He did it, he got in a hit.

  Damien went to cheer when a goon lunged at him, side stepping the guy tripped and smashed into the ground, Damien swung at the other goon but suddenly missed slamming his hand into the wall causing him to shout in pain.

  *Quest complete: Save Toby Marks from the Bullies.

  Damien's initial reaction was, he won. He saved Toby, the bullies were running away!

  SMACK

  Damien felt another punch straight between the eyes by the main thug, blood pouring from his nose like a hydrant as his head cocked backwards and his feet came out from under him. He smashed onto his back, his hands covering his face as his eyes watered. ‘I thought I won?’

  The thugs got over him and all he could see were the bottom of boots slamming down at his body and the stings of each and every one as they hit him over and over.